I've released my documentary film on the history of the right to arms, "In Search of the Second Amendment." It stars twelve professors of constitutional law, plus Steve Halbrook, David Kopel, Don Kates, and Clayton Cramer. You can order the DVD here. And here's the Wikipedia page on it. SUPREME COURT SPECIAL: additional orders only $10 each.

Massachusetts' latest

Posted by David Hardy · 18 July 2014 09:37 AM

I don't know what to file this under -- an example of where the other side wants to go, or an example of how newspaper stories are written by cut and paste of slogans that have been used and re-used for decades.

Massachusetts of course is about as restrictive as can be, but the legislature felt the need to "respond" to something by enacting something more. So it passed a bill with sundry additional restrictions, but declined one: rifle and shotgun possession requires a permit, but it's a "shall issue" one, and the legislature declined to make that "may issue."

So the cut and paste story is headlined "Massachusetts Senate approves sweeping gun bill, but strips key measure."

Here's a quote, emphasis added:

""Gun safety advocates said the change guts the bill.

John Rosenthal of the group Stop Handgun Violence, said giving police chiefs added discretion over the issuing of FID cards was the single most important aspect of the bill.

"Without it, it's not worth the paper it's written on," Rosenthal said. "Shame on the Massachusetts Senate. Sadly they voted against police chiefs and against public safety and for the special interest gun lobby and people will die as a result.""

And everyone out there can thank the US Supreme Court for their INCORRECT decision in Barron v Baltimore. That decision was another case of Marshall pulling another load out from under his black robe. If Marshall had had a brain he took it out before he decided this one. He seems to have leaned on Madison's ideas, ideas that were totally repudiated by the Congress of the time, and ignored the supremacy clause and the republican government guarantee.

The bliss-ninnies can take comfort in the fact that they removed one section of the bill, which would have allowed Massachusetts residents to possess pepper spray without first obtaining a permit. Massachusetts remains the only state in the nation that protects its people from the constant drive-by pepper spraying that plague other places.